Water Meadows Introductions to Heritage Assets Summary

Historic England’s Introductions to Heritage Assets (IHAs) are accessible, authoritative, illustrated summaries of what we know about specific types of archaeological site, building, landscape or marine asset. Typically they deal with subjects which have previously lacked such a published summary, either because the literature is dauntingly voluminous, or alternatively where little has been written. Most often it is the latter, and many IHAs bring understanding of site or building types which are neglected or little understood.

This IHA provides an introduction to water meadows (areas of grassland alongside a river or stream irrigated to produce plentiful hay crops and rich pasture). A brief chronology is included along with descriptions of the asset type and its associations. Sections on dating water meadows, and water meadows today follow. A list of in- depth sources on the topic is suggested for further reading.

This document has been prepared by Nicky Smith and Paul Stamper and edited by Joe Flatman and Pete Herring. It is one of a series of 41 documents. This edition published by Historic England October 2018. All images © Historic England unless otherwise stated.

Please refer to this document as: Historic England 2018 Water Meadows: Introductions to Heritage Assets. Historic England. Swindon

HistoricEngland.org.uk/listing/selection-criteria/scheduling-selection/ihas-archaeology/

Front cover Water meadows at Alderbury on the River Avon, south of Salisbury (Wiltshire). They were part of an extensive (250 a) and well-documented system constructed along a four-mile stretch of the river between 1665 and 1690. The scheme was financed by Sir Joseph Ashe (a wealthy cloth merchant) and constructed by his steward, John Snow. Introduction

Water meadows were areas of grassland alongside a river or stream irrigated to produce plentiful hay crops and rich pasture. Precisely engineered channels were dug so that a thin sheet of water flowed steadily across the meadows for set periods of time at prescribed seasons of the year. Water meadow operation, a practice known as ‘floating’ or ‘drowning’, involved skilled management which was often carried out by professionals known as ‘drowners’, ‘meadmen’ or ‘watermen’.

Floating deposited nutrient-laden silt and ‘early bite’ of grass for sheep flocks weeks before oxidised the soil. In winter, it provided the other pastures were ready. Floating in summer additional benefit of reducing the effects of frost raised moisture levels in the meadows, which and raising the soil temperature to produce an increased the hay crop.

Figure 1 Water meadow earthworks on the River Lugg, Herefordshire, picked out by floodwater.

1 1 Chronology

Most pre-17th century irrigation in England Bedworks, the most sophisticated type of water appears to have been by a simple process known meadow, appear for the first time in the 17th as ‘floating upwards’, which involved blocking a century as fully fledged systems. They were once watercourse, causing it to overflow and flood the believed to have been invented by Rowland surrounding farmland. This method was used from Vaughan, a Herefordshire landowner who, in at least the medieval period and, despite being 1610, described irrigation systems which he had condemned as ‘ancient’, continued to be used in created on his farm at Turnastone Court. However, some areas of England until the 18th century. any potential surviving remains of his irrigation system are quite unlike typical bedworks. In the 18th century Dutch engineers introduced a further variety of floating upwards, known as Better evidence for early bedworks comes from ‘warping’. This practice, used particularly in the Affpuddle, in Dorset, where the Manorial Court Fenlands, involved impounding seasonal tidal Book makes reference to ditches and channels, water and running it over farmland. Floating believed to have been bedworks, constructed in upwards deposited beneficial silt and provided the meadows along the River Piddle in 1605. From some frost protection, but if water failed to drain the 17th century onwards bedworks were created off quickly it could create anaerobic and toxic in large numbers, beginning in the chalkland conditions which would damage the grass. areas of Hampshire, Dorset and Wiltshire, and spreading during the 17th and 18th centuries To offset problems with water-logging, more to adjacent parts of Gloucestershire, Berkshire, sophisticated ‘floating downwards’ systems were Surrey and West Sussex. By the 1790s there were developed, which produced a constant movement an estimated 15,000 to 20,000 acres of water of water through the grass sward, and enabled meadow in Wiltshire alone. strict control of the flow of water on and off the meadows. Two main forms of floating downwards The Agricultural Revolution saw English were used: ‘catchworks’ and ‘bedworks’, each wetlands turned into productive fields and suited to different topography. pastures. As food prices rose dramatically during the Napoleonic Wars of 1803-1815, more Catchworks have been found all over Europe landowners and farmers invested in catchworks and field names such as ‘Waterleets’, and ‘Le and bedworks. As the 19th century progressed Flodgatemedewe’ recorded during the 13th they became a fashionable form of agricultural to 16th centuries suggest they were used in ‘improvement’, with some landowners offering England during the medieval period. There is a prizes for their creation and providing raw possible 12th century example at Rievaulx Abbey, materials to encourage their tenants to construct Yorkshire. By the early 17th century catchworks them. were well established in upland parts of south- west England, becoming a particular feature of Throughout the late 18th and 19th centuries areas such as Exmoor, and they became more they were promoted by agricultural improvers widespread during the later 17th and 18th such as George Boswell (A Treatise on Watering centuries. Meadows 1779), Thomas Wright (An Account of the Advantages of Watering Meadows by Art, 1789), William Smith (Observations on the Utility,

< < Summary 2 Figure 2 At Prisley Farm, Bedfordshire, William Smith worked for the Duke of Bedford, transforming boggy ground into water meadows.

Form and Management of Water Meadows and The Decline of Water Meadows the Drowning of Peat Bogs with an account of Prisley Bog, 1806), James Loch (An Account of the Water meadows fell out of use from the late Improvements on the Estates of the Marquis of 19th century onwards, following the onset of Stafford, 1820), via papers in the Royal Agricultural agricultural recession. During this period imports Society of England’s Journal and through various of cheap foreign grain began, fodder root crops county surveys or ‘General Views’ produced for and oil cake were introduced and new grass the newly-created Board of Agriculture during the strains and artificial fertilisers were developed. 1790s and early 1800s (Figure 2). By 1850 water Catchwork meadows became redundant, as hill meadows had expanded beyond their heartland pastures could be improved by reseeding and areas and in southern England extended to nitrogen application. Bedworks also declined as approximately 100,000 acres. the sheep and corn farming system, of which they were an integral part, broke down in Wessex.

< < Summary 3 In addition to imported grain, improved transport option on soft, wet ground surfaces which could links heralded an influx of refrigerated lamb from not bear the weight of modern machinery. New Zealand which under-cut British meat prices. By the 1930s dairy cattle had replaced sheep Between 1918 and 1960 almost all water meadows on surviving bedwork meadows and the sale of were abandoned and large numbers were milk, sent to towns by rail, kept many farmers subsequently leveled as their sites were put to in business. However, by the mid-20th century new uses. In the 1950s and 1960s the Ministry of falling milk prices and a shortage of labour made Agriculture, Fisheries and Food offered grants for the few surviving water meadows uneconomical leveling old water meadows as part of a wider to maintain and mechanisation was not a viable drive for more efficient food production.

< < Summary 4 2 Description

The remains of ‘floating upwards’ systems are Bedworks were more complex systems used likely to consist of a dam or similar structure used to irrigate relatively level ground on river to block a watercourse. Evidence for such systems floodplains. A weir or dam containing sluices is highly elusive. was placed across a river allowing water to be diverted into a carrier channel known as a ‘head The distinctive character of downward-floated main’, which was frequently sited on the outside water meadows lies in their patterns of drains and of a bend. A hatch was opened allowing water to carriers. The layout of these varies depending on flow into the head main and be carried through a their period of construction, the land ownership network of progressively narrower and shallower or tenancy patterns and, most importantly, the channels, each carefully aligned according to the topography. gradient of the meadow. Subsidiary hatches and turf ‘stops’ were used to keep fine control of the Water meadows can also vary considerably in water which was distributed to selected areas as extent, from a few hectares to entire lengths needed. It eventually entered tapering channels of river floodplains, frequently occurring in known as ‘floats’, running along the apexes of groups where the topographical and geological parallel ridges known as ‘beds’ and was made conditions were most suitable. They contain little to overflow onto each part of the meadow in complex stratigraphy, so their archaeological succession, running down the sides (‘panes’) of integrity is maintained largely by the retention of the ridges as a continuous moving film no more visible features. than 25 mm deep. Run-off was removed from the meadow via a network of drains between the The simplest form of downward floated water ridges. The drains mirror the arrangement of the meadow was the catchwork (also known as mains and floats, beginning as small gullies and a ‘catch meadow’ or ‘field gutter’ system). becoming progressively larger as they lead to a Catchworks used spring water or hill-side streams single ‘tail drain’. to irrigate valley or hill slopes. If neither of these water sources was available rainwater and Bedworks thus appear as prominent ridges with farmyard run-off was collected in a specially- interlocking channels. The widths and heights constructed feeder pond. Water was diverted of the ridges range considerably, from 3-15 m from the source into a contour-following ditch (commonly 5 m) wide and about 0.5-0.6 m high. or ‘gutter’ which skirted the top of the meadow. They can resemble the plough ridges of former When the gutter was blocked by ‘stops’ of turf, cultivation and recent research has indicated peat or logs, or by using more permanent sluices, that some early ridge-and-furrow might have water overflowed down the hillside and irrigated been re-employed for water meadows. However, the area of meadow below. Further downslope, the layout and form of the ridges, their location, additional gutters parallel to the first caught the and the presence of water control structures run-off and redistributed it in a similar manner to and additional channels all help to distinguish lower pastures. The process encouraged an even bedworks from ridge-and-furrow (Figure 5). flow of water down the slope. At the base of the meadow surplus water was collected and carried Very little research has been carried out to away via a drain (Figures 3 and 4). establish a national typology of water meadows, but field surveys have shed light on their regional

< < Summary 5 Figure 3 Catchwork meadows are evident today as parallel contour-following channels (‘field gutters’) on hill slopes, as seen here at Cloggs Farm, Somerset.

Figure 4 At Cloggs Farm water from a pond flowed into a leat which passed through the farm complex, driving a water wheel. This powered a threshing machine, a grinder, a chaff cutter, a shearing machine and a wood saw. The leat then passed through the farmyard, collecting slurry which it transported to the meadows via the ‘field gutters’ on the valley side to the south. Water was collected at the foot of the hill and drained back to a brook. The exact date of construction of this system is not known, but it may be contemporary with the farmstead which dates from at least 1688.

< < Summary 6 Figure 5 Reconstruction drawing showing a typical bedwork water meadow.

River Avon

Main carrier Side carrier Main drain Side drain

Figure 7 A herringbone bedwork layout, using straight ridges, surveyed by the RCHME at Compton, Wiltshire.

0 100 Metres

The profiles of bedwork ridges also varied, from Figure 6 high, rounded forms recorded in Wessex to broad, RCHME survey showing a bedwork layout of flat-topped forms with sharply-defined edges curved ridges perpendicular to a main carrier at recorded in Norfolk. This difference may be Hindurrington, Wiltshire. attributed to variations in local topography and the amount of water available. Early 19th century farmers in Dorset, for example, complained that development. Work in Wiltshire by the Royal very wide ridges were too flat to provide an Commission on the Historical Monuments of adequate flow of water across the meadows. England (RCHME) identified two main bedwork layouts: right-angled (Figure 6) or herringbone Built structures were common features of water (Figure 7). Some systems were highly geometric meadows. Bridges provided access, while culverts with straight ridges and channels, while others took channels beneath roadways and aqueducts were irregular with curved ridges. transported water to further areas of meadow.

< < Summary 7 Bedwork systems had a main weir or dam to divert water from the river or other source and subsidiary weirs and sluices (one-hatch weirs) on smaller carriers to ensure an even distribution of water. These structures came in a variety of materials depending on what was readily available at the time of their construction (Figure 8). Early hatches were simple boards which slotted vertically into wooden frames or stone settings and were raised by peg and hole arrangements (Figure 9). Later, materials such as brick and cement were used for hatch settings and their boards were fitted with iron ratchet and crowbar raising mechanisms. At the beginning of the 19th century cast iron weirs and hatches came into use. Figure 8 The majority of these structures are ruinous today, A restored water meadow hatch in use today at Harnham, Wiltshire. but collections of loose material near the banks of rivers or streams may indicate their former sites or the presence of buried examples.

Figure 9 A drowner at work on a seven-hatch weir at Lower Farm, Britford, near Salisbury, in 1954.

< < Summary 8 3 Distribution

Water meadows were created anywhere where Bedwork remains are found alongside main rivers, conditions were suitable and their remains tributaries, minor streams and brooks, sometimes were distributed widely across England. They clustering at confluences where most water was were more prolific in some areas than others, available and floodplains were widest. Large depending on the local topography, agricultural numbers are associated with chalkland rivers of system or the former presence of large estates southern England which provided a reliable flow owned by 18th and 19th century agricultural of water at a constant temperature and good improvers. subsoil drainage.

As catchworks used sloping ground and were Bedworks were an essential component of the relatively cheap to construct and operate without ‘sheep and corn’ economy of Wiltshire, Dorset employing professional drowners, they were and Hampshire for over 400 years. Sheep grazed popular with hill farmers in Devon, Somerset on the meadows during the day and were moved and the Welsh Marches by the mid-18th century. to unsown arable fields to enrich the soil with The improvements catchworks made to hill their dung each evening (Figure 10). Before the pastures were dramatic. They transported lime introduction of water meadows, the size of sheep and animal dung to pastures by ‘flush’ irrigation flocks was limited by the amount of food available episodes, treating the grass sward with suspended to sustain stock through the winter, particularly nutrients – a process known as ‘washing in’, during the ‘hungry gap’ in March and April when whereby dung and lime was mixed into the hay supplies were low and grass had not yet water. The flow of water also improved the soil grown. Water meadows promoted grass growth through oxygenation and broadleaved grasses several weeks before natural grazing became flourished at the expense of coarser species. A available and increased the summer hay crop. late form of catchwork widespread in Britain from This meant that larger sheep flocks could be kept, the mid-18th century was sewage irrigation, in more manure was produced and arable cultivation which urban sewage was passed along drains to could be extended to grow more corn. catchwork systems or carted to farms and mixed with head main water. Although expensive to construct and maintain, bedworks became so profitable that, by the 18th Catchwork remains are a particular feature century, they occupied almost every significant of Exmoor, where agricultural improvements floodplain in the region. They commonly doubled promoted by large estates meant that most farms the value of meadow land and could increase its possessed a system during the 19th century. value by as much as sixty times its unimproved Farmsteads built by the Knight family for tenant price. farmers from 1815 onwards were all provided with gutters which passed through farmyards or byres, transporting dung and urine mixed with water onto the meadows.

< < Summary 9 Hay and haymaking

Hay is dried grass, and until artificial feedstuffs and root crops became widely available in the 19th century, it was the principal winter feed for farm animals – without it draught animals and breeding stock could not be kept alive and in good condition through until spring. For livestock farmers, in particular, securing an adequate reserve of good quality hay was the principal summer task.

While hay was made in many fields, generally Figure 10 speaking the best grass for hay was that grown in In ‘sheep and corn’ areas sheep were moved from waterside meadows, especially carefully-managed water meadows to unsown arable fields each evening. water meadows. The grass was tall, lush and rich This photograph shows the evening procession of sheep from water meadows by the River Kennet, near in nutrients. Experienced farmers were able to Marlborough. judge when it was ready to be cut, and when a spell of good, sunny, haymaking weather seemed likely: make hay while the sun shines, as the old Both catchworks and bedworks were used in other proverb has it. Typically this was in later June or areas of England with varying degrees of success. July. In addition to the core areas of Wessex and the south-western hills, they have been recorded It was essential to get the grass cut and dried – in many Midland counties, the Welsh Marches turned into hay – as quickly as possible, to reduce and East Anglia. They were adapted to difficult its moisture content from about 75 per cent to 15 topography, such as the narrow upper valley per cent. The longer it took to dry (for instance if of the River Wey in Hampshire, where contour- unexpected rain came) the poorer was its quality following carrier channels were used to raise and nutritional value. Thus – especially until water above the river level, aqueducts by-passed haymaking started to be mechanised in the mid- bottlenecks in the valley and both the valley sides 19th century – as large a labour force as possible and the narrow valley floor were irrigated using would be assembled, often a mixture of the combinations of catchworks and bedworks. farmer’s family, tenants and hired hands. Typically these worked from dawn until dusk, kept going Nineteenth century commentators unanimously with copious amounts of beer or cider. state that water meadows were virtually unknown in northern and eastern England. While it is true Working in a line, haymakers moved methodically that the cold and dry climate, poor-draining across the meadow, cutting the lush grass with soils and gentle gradients of the rivers in eastern long-bladed scythes, which would be kept razor- England made it less favourable for water shape with whetstones. This process left the cut meadows, they were adopted sparingly during grass in lines, and women and children would use the 17th and 18th centuries, and in the early 19th pitchforks and rakes to turn and fluff the grass in century systems managed along Wessex lines these ‘windrows’ to speed even drying. Typically were introduced to improve the hay crop. this would take a couple of days, and overnight the hay would be raked into heaps – haycocks – to minimise any damage by rain or heavy dew. In the morning the cocks would be opened up, and the turning resumed (Figure 11).

< < Summary 10 Figure 11 Haymaking at Byfield (Northamptonshire) around the time of the First World War. The dried hay, lying in windrows, is being loaded onto wagons; one has an almost full load; the next waits to the right. On the left is a horse-drawn hay rake, used to scrape up the scattered remnants of the valuable crop.

As soon as the hay was dry it was pitched onto a few weeks, were thatched with straw to keep out haywains – capacious wagons with high sides – the weather. Come winter, a large-bladed knife and carted to where it was to be stored. Some was used to cut blocks of the compressed hay. would immediately be pitched into the lofts of This was fed to stock, either in the barn or shed stables or into well-ventilated barns. The rest or in the field. Sometimes a second cut of hay would be made into hayricks, normally to one was taken from water meadows a few weeks after side of the farmyard. Like a house, these ricks had the first, although this grass was probably less pitched tops which, once the hay had settled over nutritious.

< < Summary 11 4 Dating Water Meadows

A detailed complementary approach using Built structures provide further clues, although documentary records, structural dating and many will have replaced earlier structures and field survey is likely to provide the most useful so indicate the later stages of a water meadow’s information about the origins of a water meadow period of use. It is possible to estimate the date system. Nineteenth century Ordnance Survey of bricks by their size, shape or maker’s marks, to 25” maps, or earlier estate maps, may show the recognise 19th century concrete and to identify layout of major channels and the positions of the sources of stone used. The presence of hatch sluices. Historic aerial photographs frequently settings and bridges of rough-hewn stone blocks capture water meadows as they existed in the may indicate an early water meadow, constructed 20th century, while documents such as estate before the mid-18th century when brick became accounts, water abstraction agreements or freely available (Figures 12 and 13). Later hatches records of disputes may provide clues to dates of sometimes had iron mechanisms – levers and rack construction and periods of use. and pinions derived from water mill technology - to assist in raising and lowering hatches. In 1811 Landscape study may also reveal relationships Hossey and Galpin of Dorchester produced the between water meadows and other features first cast-iron weirs and hatches, which were far in the landscape, providing relative dates for more durable than earlier wooden ones. Many a water meadow’s period of use. For example, more were produced in local foundries between meadows at Britford, Wiltshire, and Dilham, 1880 and 1910. Sometimes there may be an Norfolk, run off the Avon Navigation (constructed inscribed date on a built structure, though this is 1675-1730) and the Ant Navigation (constructed unlikely to date the whole system. 1825) respectively and so cannot pre-date these features. Similarly, truncation of water meadows by later developments such as railway lines, roads and urban expansion provides cut-off dates for their abandonment.

< < Summary 12 Figure 12 Slotted stones are often all that remains of water meadow sluices. They are difficult to date without evidence from other sources, though later sluices were frequently brick-built.

Figure 13 Aqueducts carried water through narrow sections of the Wey Valley, allowing its water meadow systems to function in difficult topography. This example at Bramshott Court is one of several built to connect water meadows on either side of the river.

< < Summary 13 5 Associations

Water meadows can be spatially or functionally related to a range of contemporary monuments. These include farmsteads, religious houses, stately homes, canals, manor houses, stock enclosures, barns, field systems, landscaped parks, roads, trackways, settlements, watermills, bridges, fords and ponds.

Water meadows were typically laid out within pre- Co-operation between landowners over rights to existing field patterns and drainage systems which water was essential for securing a reliable supply are reflected in their layout. Many catchworks for irrigation, so water meadow systems were were ‘integrated systems’ closely associated often initiatives of landowners with large estates. with isolated farmsteads where the main supply of water passed through a farmyard or byre. Fashionable during the late 18th and early Watermills and water meadows were also used 19th centuries, they were often incorporated into in combination, with the raised water tables the layout of landscaped parks, as at Woburn, employed to drive mills being re-used to float Bedfordshire, where the Duke of Bedford’s meadows and the mill leats supplying water to the meadows were fed from the ‘Temple reservoir’. meadows. Capability Brown also created a number of irrigated meadows within the parks he designed, Although rivers and upland springs were the usual as did other landscape designers. sources of water, other sources were exploited as necessary, so a few water meadows tapped into canal systems or were fed from artificial ponds.

< < Summary 14 6 Water Meadows Today

In common with many historic features of the Water meadows have attracted academic interest English rural landscape, water meadows are and publications provide a wealth of information poorly protected and research has shown a high about their later history, ecological benefits and rate of attrition. In the water meadow heartland day-to-day maintenance (see Further Reading of Hampshire, a pilot study by the County Council below). Despite this, some aspects are still poorly showed that only four per cent of surviving understood. water meadow remains could be classified as ‘well preserved’ while forty per cent of water Floating upwards systems are barely represented meadows identified from mid-20th century aerial in the archaeological record, since their remains photographs had been destroyed by 1998. are extremely difficult to identify. The origins of floating downwards remains obscure and Water meadow remains are frequently bedworks appear to be absent before the 16th to unidentified and under-represented in Historic 17th centuries when they emerge fully developed Environment Records (HERs). While identifying without any known precedents. A national the presence of surviving remains may be a overview of water meadows to identify their full first step towards their protection it does not distribution and their regional characteristics is guarantee survival, as shown by recent work in also lacking. Herefordshire where recorded systems have been destroyed in recent years. Statutory protection is rare and although some individual water meadow structures are listed, very few complete systems are scheduled.

< < Summary 15 7 Further Reading

Informative accounts are contained in the Further counties and regions are covered by following collections of papers: Water Meadows: additional papers in the Agricultural History History, Ecology and Conservation (2007), and Review, including: ‘Floated water meadows in Water Management in the English Landscape: Norfolk; a misplaced innovation’ by Susanna Field, Marsh and Meadow (1999) both edited Wade Martins and Tom Williamson (volume 42 by Hadrian Cook and Tom Williamson, and (1994), 20-37) and ‘The origins of water meadows Water Meadows: Living Treasures in the English in England’ by Hadrian Cook, Kathy Stearne and Landscape (2005) edited by Mark Everard. Tom Williamson (volume 51 (2003), 155-62).

Wiltshire is the subject of several publications A series of detailed, local, topographical surveys including Eric Kerridge’s ‘The floating of Wiltshire of water meadows was carried out by the RCHME, water meadows’ Wiltshire Archaeological most of which are available from Historic England Magazine 55 (1953),105-18, George Atwood’s as grey literature reports. ‘A study of the Wiltshire water meadows’ Wiltshire Archaeological Magazine 58 (1963), 403-13, John Examples and summary accounts are included in Bettey’s ‘The development of water meadows in McOmish, Field and Brown’s The Field Archaeology the Salisbury Avon 1665-1690’ Agricultural History of the Salisbury Plain Training Area (2002), Review 51 (2003), 163-72, and more recently 132-6, and Riley and Wilson-North’s The Field Michael Cowan’s Wiltshire Water Meadows (2005). Archaeology of Exmoor (2001), 128-9.

For Dorset, there is B Jane Whitehead’s Rowland Vaughan’s irrigation system is examined ‘Management and land-use of water meadows in Taylor, Smith and Brown’s paper ‘Rowland in the Frome Valley’ Proceedings of the Dorset Vaughan and the origins of downward floated Natural History & Archaeological Society 89 (1967), water-meadows: a contribution to the debate’, 251-81 and John Bettey’s ‘The development of Landscape History 28 (2006), 35-51. water meadows in Dorset during the seventeenth century’ Agricultural History Review 25 (1977), 37‑43.

< < Summary 16 8 Where to Get Advice

If you would like to contact the Listing Team in one of our regional offices, please email: [email protected] noting the subject of your query, or call or write to the local team at:

North Region South Region 37 Tanner Row 4th Floor York Cannon Bridge House YO1 6WP 25 Dowgate Hill Tel: 01904 601948 London Fax: 01904 601999 EC4R 2YA Tel: 020 7973 3700 Fax: 020 7973 3001

East Region West Region Brooklands 29 Queen Square 24 Brooklands Avenue Bristol Cambridge CB2 8BU BS1 4ND Tel: 01223 582749 Tel: 0117 975 1308 Fax: 01223 582701 Fax: 0117 975 0701

< < Summary 17 9 Acknowledgments

Cover: Water meadows at Alderbury on the River Avon, south of Salisbury (Wiltshire). © Historic England, cat no. 24186_017.

Figure 1: © Clwyd-Powys Archaeological Trust

Figures 2, 9 and 10: © Museum of English Rural Life, Reading University

Figures 8, 12 and 13: Nicky Smith

< < Summary 18 We are the public body that helps people care for, enjoy and celebrate England’s spectacular historic environment.

Please contact [email protected] with any questions about this document.

HistoricEngland.org.uk

If you would like this document in a different format, please contact our customer services department on:

Tel: 0370 333 0607 Email: [email protected]

All information and weblinks accurate at the time of publication.

Please consider the environment before printing this document

HEAG237 Publication date: v1.0 May 2011 © English Heritage Reissue date v1.1 October 2018 © Historic England Design: Historic England and APS.